Comedic "things you would ban": minor things that irritate you

[Techniquest]

"Sex sells" has been a motto in the advertising industry since at least the 1950s.

I thought the same there. I keep seeing adverts for alcohol products lately, and so many of them are non-skippable. It doesn't really matter what time of day you're watching YouTube either, they come up all the time. The relevant companies must be missing their revenue peaks from the lockdowns!

As for the tennis players grunting, I have to agree that there's no need for it every couple of seconds. It's bound to happen sometimes, when pushing the body hard, but they appear to do it just for the attention!

 

[43096]

Chip and pin terminals now asking questions about if I’m happy with the service. *^%# off, I just want to pay.

 

[gg1]

As for the tennis players grunting, I have to agree that there's no need for it every couple of seconds. It's bound to happen sometimes, when pushing the body hard, but they appear to do it just for the attention!

I suspect some of the do it as an attempt to distract the opposing player.

 

[adrock1976]

Though I have approximately zero interest in tennis; I seem to remember that that practice? -- mannerism? -- got much attention some decades ago: with especial focus on a particular player, one Monica Seles: whose "grunting at every stroke / hit", was a focus of obsession in the media for a while (her being an attractive young woman, likely had something to do with that). A spell thus, of unending media "burble" about Monica and her grunting; I recall one particular piece, a rather entertaining flight of fancy taking off at a tangent -- imagining, way back, grumpy conservative Neanderthals decrying the new, ultra-"woke" invention-type fad: of language, and having conversations. "If grunting was good enough for our forbears, it's good enough for us ... ".

I thought the same there. I keep seeing adverts for alcohol products lately, and so many of them are non-skippable. It doesn't really matter what time of day you're watching YouTube either, they come up all the time. The relevant companies must be missing their revenue peaks from the lockdowns!

As for the tennis players grunting, I have to agree that there's no need for it every couple of seconds. It's bound to happen sometimes, when pushing the body hard, but they appear to do it just for the attention!

I suspect some of the do it as an attempt to distract the opposing player.

I do recall Maria Sharapova not grunting, but doing ear piercing screams every time she went to hit the ball.

I am surprised that the spectators and the umpire did not suffer from hearing damage due to the volume of the shrieks and screams.

 

[Busaholic]

Supermarket self-service tills that argue the toss with you.

I had one the other day that said: "Are you sure this item costs £1.75?".
Completely flummoxed me, I had no idea, it was on the shopping list so I simply picked it off the shelf. There wasn't an option for "I think so".
Even the "till minder" assistant conceded he'd never seen a message like that before.
I said to him, "It's me, isn't it? The machine hates me."
He didn't demur .....

I'd have replied to the message 'You tell me,mate!'

Machines hate me too (got to say it's often mutual.) Hospital car park yesterday, barrier at exit takes my paid-for ticket then resolutely refuses to open (second time running, separated by several months.) This time, after about two minutes it spews the ticket out, I re-insert it and the barrier opens. Last time, the man in an office on the adjoining car park had to come over, open the machine, get the ticket out, scratch his head metaphorically for five minutes and reluctantly open the barrier. This all took fifteen minutes, with frustrated motorists behind me, as there is only the one exit barrier.

 

[westv]

People who post pictures of themselves/family/friends on their Tripadvisor reviews.

 

[Bald Rick]

Stealth Birds that eat the Strawberries growing in my garden.

Also; cats that live in my house and will happily catch rodents, birds etc. at any time to Present to me when I’m in a hurry to do something else than clear up the remains, but when encouraged to patrol the Strawberry growing area to deter birds, decide to go to sleep on my bed.

Also; cat hair. It appears to have a special property that attracts it to my clothes.

 

[ABB125]

Stealth Birds that eat the Strawberries growing in my garden.

Also; cats that live in my house and will happily catch rodents, birds etc. at any time to Present to me when I’m in a hurry to do something else than clear up the remains, but when encouraged to patrol the Strawberry growing area to deter birds, decide to go to sleep on my bed.

Also; cat hair. It appears to have a special property that attracts it to my clothes.

Solution: get a vicious attack dog (eg: labradoodle) instead!

 

[Bletchleyite]

Chip and pin terminals now asking questions about if I’m happy with the service. *^%# off, I just want to pay.

Or worse the ones that ask you if you want to donate to charity without saying what charity.

 

[52290]

People who post pictures of themselves/family/friends on their Tripadvisor reviews.

People who post reviews on Tripadvisor.

 

[Bletchleyite]

People who post reviews on Tripadvisor.

Why? They can be rather useful. You don't run a third-rate hotel business, do you?

Yes, there's often one unreasonable nutter, but I definitely think it's worth, when going somewhere you've not been before, reading through all the 1 and 2-star reviews and seeing if there's a common theme that might bother you. Just like with eBay sellers - I read the negative reviews and see if I see a common theme.

 

[52290]

Why? They can be rather useful. You don't run a third-rate hotel business, do you?

Yes, there's often one unreasonable nutter, but I definitely think it's worth, when going somewhere you've not been before, reading through all the 1 and 2-star reviews and seeing if there's a common theme that might bother you. Just like with eBay sellers - I read the negative reviews and see if I see a common theme.

No, I don't run anything, I just feel that they are open to corruption, both the gushingly favourable ones and the terrible hell on earth ones.

 

[Bletchleyite]

No, I don't run anything, I just feel that they are open to corruption, both the gushingly favourable ones and the terrible hell on earth ones.

They are, which is why it is necessary to read them as a whole to see trends rather than to assume one bad review is actually truthful. I pretty much entirely ignore the good ones as as you say they're often shills, more interesting is the general theme of the bad ones. If there's something consistent in a large number of differently-dated bad ones, e.g. on something like cleanliness or staff unhelpfulness, it's usually true. Same with eBay/Amazon - very often a given supplier is generally fine but if a parcel gets lost they aren't any help, for instance - that would put me off.

It's also sometimes visible when a change of management has changed somewhere from generally good to generally bad, or when it's just been teething troubles.

 

[Gloster]

Spellcheck refusing to allow you to spell a word the way you want, no matter how many times you type it in your way. Or adding a capital letter at the start (mine seems obsessed with May), adding an incorrect apostrophe (not just the greengrocer’s), changing the tense of a verb, etc.

 

[Jimini]

Spellcheck refusing to allow you to spell a word the way you want, no matter how many times you type it in your way. Or adding a capital letter at the start (mine seems obsessed with May), adding an incorrect apostrophe (not just the greengrocer’s), changing the tense of a verb, etc.

Indeed. For example, my iPhone is a huge fan of the word “ducking”, it seems

 

[Busaholic]

Indeed. For example, my iPhone is a huge fan of the word “ducking”, it seems

''Ducking stool'' is a particularly nice example of Cockney rhyming slang, S.E. London version.

 

[Bevan Price]

Spellcheck refusing to allow you to spell a word the way you want, no matter how many times you type it in your way. Or adding a capital letter at the start (mine seems obsessed with May), adding an incorrect apostrophe (not just the greengrocer’s), changing the tense of a verb, etc.

That is why I disable spellcheckers everywhere they appear on my devices. They are particularly annoying when you try to type station or place names.

 

[Techniquest]

That is why I disable spellcheckers everywhere they appear on my devices. They are particularly annoying when you try to type station or place names.

I usually disable spellchecker on my new phone whenever I get one, but Autocorrect and spellchecker software have actually been quite handy in a number of situations in the last year and a bit. Not always though, for some reason it didn't auto-correct 'quire' to 'quite' like it should have when my thumbs tapped the wrong buttons today, so sometimes I still have to manually change things.

When it auto-capitalises things when I don't want that to happen though, that annoys me.

 

[Whistler40145]

Females with caked on makeup, false eyelashes that resemble a yard brush and eyebrows that look like some furry creature has stopped for a rest

Also, I find it totally insincere when some males say "Cheers Pal or Cheers Mate" when I've never seen you before in my lifetime

 

[Busaholic]

Females with caked on makeup, false eyelashes that resemble a yard brush and eyebrows that look like some furry creature has stopped for a rest

Are you absolutely sure they are female?

 

[Whistler40145]

Are you absolutely sure they are female?

Definitely

 

[Basil Jet]

I have no problem with concrete as a structural material, but it should be banned as a finish, unless it's the Snowcrete that they used in the Perivale Hoover building.

Edit: actually, some of the textured concrete on the Elizabeth Line is okay, so I suppose it is expanses of smooth concrete that should be banned.

 

[ScotRail158725]

Also, I find it totally insincere when some males say "Cheers Pal or Cheers Mate" when I've never seen you before in my lifetime

I say this to near enough everybody, its a bad habit for me

 

[GusB]

Also, I find it totally insincere when some males say "Cheers Pal or Cheers Mate" when I've never seen you before in my lifetime

I say this to near enough everybody, its a bad habit for me

It's also just a figure of speech and something that we shouldn't really get too worked up about.

 

[birchesgreen]

Also, I find it totally insincere when some males say "Cheers Pal or Cheers Mate" when I've never seen you before in my lifetime

Dave Allan was great on this, we call people we are about to fight with or dislike "mate" or "pal" but our actual friends we call b*****d

 

[Gloster]

I say, “Cheers,” as I get off the bus. Even though they are just doing the job that they are being paid for, rather than a gratuitous good deed, I feel acknowledgement is reasonable. (*) However, something more formal, like, “Thank you, driver,” can sound a bit patronising if you get the tone wrong.

I never call anyone mate or pal: it is sloppy if they are and overly familiar if they aren’t. Worse, they might think they are your pal. Similarly, if they say it to me my feeling is, “Who are they to decide unilaterally that they are my pal or mate?”

* - Nobody ever said, “Thank you, Mr Signalman, for signalling my train.” It was, “Why don’t you ******** get a ******** move on. I’m in a ******* hurry, you lazy ****.”

 

[Yew]

Chip and pin terminals now asking questions about if I’m happy with the service. *^%# off, I just want to pay.

Similar with upselling and charity donation requests on self service machines in restaurants and supermarkets.

 

[43096]

Similar with upselling and charity donation requests on self service machines in restaurants and supermarkets.

Agreed! The implementation of this seems to have been nicely timed to round up your spend just as we hit a cost of living crisis.

 

[PeterY]

Similar with upselling and charity donation requests on self service machines in restaurants and supermarkets.

I'm so wary now of these. I do give to charities but charities of my choice.

 

[Gloster]

It does seem to be creeping that a number of organisations seem to be moving towards the ‘public shaming’ method, or maybe I have just been unlucky with those I have dealt with. The ‘you must be a cruel person for not giving money to save the lesser-spotted eight-legged Patagonian sloth’ method, with the vague threat that they will speak loud enough for those around you to hear and be shocked. It is not common, but a decade or so ago it was so rare that you could put it down to an individual obsessive. But then, a few weeks ago I had the opposite: a chap giving me an earful for putting a jar of jam in the food bank donations basket. (‘Encouraging layabouts to live off others and not get themselves a job...’ I didn’t hear much as I walked off.)